Kylie Minogue has showed off her saucy side as she kicked off the European leg of her Kiss Me Once tour in the UK.

The 46-year-old pop star played up her sex appeal at Liverpool's Echo Arena, as she performed in revealing outfits and shimmied up to a bare-chested dancer clad only in a pink towel on the opening night.

The spectacular show, which accompanied the release of Kylie's latest album Kiss Me Once, featured a sugar-coated hot pink life-size dolls' house, giant glowing red lips, and neon windows of peep shows and strip clubs, along with showgirls decorated in red lobsters.

"Aaaargghhhh!!! First show done. I've literally just come off stage. Thank you SO much Liverpool!!..." she tweeted after the gig.

Before the show started, an eight-minute film Sleepwalker, starring the star as different characters including incarnations of Miss Havisham and Sleeping Beauty, was played. The short movie debuted three new songs by Kylie and Garibay - Glow, Wait and Break This Heartbreak.

"For me, it's the ultimate because you are really living in the moment. All aspects of what I do have to come together in a live environment, which is at once thrilling and nerve-racking! Having so much shared energy in one place is amazing," she said.

"We are all there for the same thing - united in that space and time. Also, I am aware that almost everyone in the audience has played a part in my life, and I in theirs, although we have never met."

Kylie showed off an array of glittering costumes on the night, including a Marchesa couture gown, a silver and blue mirrored dress by Julien Macdonald and a Dolce And Gabbana corset, accompanied by a sparkling Swarovski crystal headpiece.

"I'm always a little jealous - in the theatre world they get to have previews and you don't get that in this biz. It's like opening night is the first time you have a show with an audience and really get to know what the response is!" she told ITV's Lorraine.

And Kylie said she doesn't want to stop: "It's awful afterwards people tend to say at the end of the tour, 'You really must want to do nothing and have a good rest' but you're like, 'No, no I don't' because it's a physical - mental as well - thing to keep going. To suddenly go to nothing, it's a disaster darling!"